editing

5 lessons from the NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism 2017 winners

In the five years that I have captained this blog, I have written this post four times. It remains one of my favorite annual pieces to pen, because it involves one of my favorite annual traditions: watching the winners of the NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism video awards.

Every year I sit down, click on links, and marvel at the winners. And every year I take away new lessons that, I hope, will boost my own work. This year I was named a NPPA finalist for three of my stories, and I won the association’s prize for Solo Video Journalist of the Year. But I found, in the Best of Photojournalism winners, work that inspires me to improve and compels me to keep crafting.

Here are five lessons that will stay with me – and perhaps you too:

THE STORYLight Will Prevail, by Ryan Oliveira (KXAS-TV, Dallas)
THE LESSON: Sometimes the best treatment for raw emotion is restraint behind the camera.

A mass shooting last fall at a baptist church caused a crush of media to descend on the tiny town of Sutherland Springs, Tex. Residents struggled to grasp with the horror and loss, and they didn’t hide their emotions.

In this story, which took first place in the category of General Hard News Photography, Ryan Oliveira of NBC5 in Dallas met the rawness with distance and technique. He largely kept his camera back, focusing instead on framing and lighting exquisite shots to capture the intensity. I cannot say enough about his sensitivity here, and the same goes for his teammate on this story, reporter Noelle Walker. I have no doubt they were moved by what they saw in Sutherland Springs. It showed in pieces like this, that eschew boldness and instead show tenderness and sympathy during a tragic time.

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A video journalism how-to guide, from KUSA-TV’s Michael Driver

Consider this a cheat sheet.

Last week’s podcast with KUSA-TV photojournalist Michael Driver was one of the most-downloaded Telling The Story podcasts to date.

But, as I noted then, Driver was almost too good a guest.

He offered so much advice in such a short period of time, and while we were recording the interview, I kept thinking I could better serve photojournalists — heck, better serve myself — by transcribing all of Driver’s terrific tidbits.

I always enjoy the discussion of journalism, and I have used this blog several times to focus specifically on photojournalism. Check out my spotlight on the best NPPA video stories from 2012 or my podcast with KDVR-TV photographer Anne Herbst. Great photojournalism is an art that often must be sustained and passed down by, not station managers or other journalists, but the artists themselves.

Here is a thorough collection of important advice from Driver, one of the top photojournalists in the country.

BEFORE YOU SHOOT:

Back-time your day: “You need to make sure you know how much time you’re going to have to do this stuff. Give yourself enough time to edit and do the story properly. You have to have a plan in place. If you go in like, ‘We’ll see what happens,’ you’re going to run out of time. We work in a business where deadlines are our enemy. You have to make sure you get everything you can in the quickest amount of time, and then give yourself enough time to work on it.”

Work with your reporter (if you have one): “We’re constantly communicating, constantly talking about what we’re going to do. Talk to your reporter. When you get out to a scene, you’re not going to know exactly what it is. It’s constantly talking about, ‘What elements do we need? What are the visuals we need to tell this story?'”

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PODCAST EPISODE #2: Ed Kilgore, Buffalo Broadcasting Hall of Famer

At the end of my latest podcast interview, with my former co-worker and dean of Buffalo sportscasters Ed Kilgore, the former WGRZ-TV sports anchor reminded me of a conversation we once had during a slow moment at work.

Apparently (and I vaguely remember this), I asked Kilgore — in all sincerity — if he felt Tommy Lee Jones had underachieved.

And then, he recalls, we seriously discussed this topic for several minutes.

Such is the spirit of Ed Kilgore. He is a man who enjoys discussion, no matter what the topic. I shared a cubicle with Kilgore during my time at WGRZ-TV, the NBC affiliate in Buffalo, and I always knew I could rope him into a deep conversation if I so desired. Kilgore, like myself, enjoys thinking about and dissecting topics — even a topic as seemingly silly as Tommy Lee Jones’ movie career.

Kilgore joined me for Episode #2 of the Telling the Story podcast. A quick bio: he worked at WGRZ-TV for 40 years before retiring last month. He covered four Super Bowls, the Miracle on Ice, and pretty much every big recent sporting event involving the city of Buffalo. He was inducted in 2010 to the Buffalo Broadcasting Hall of Fame, and he is by far the most famous sports anchor to have graced Western New York.

In the podcast, we touched on very little of this, because the last decade of Kilgore’s broadcasting career was arguably the most interesting in the context of storytelling. He saw his role change, learning how to edit highlights and becoming a force on social media, and experienced a much darker period in Buffalo sports (the NFL’s Bills have not made the playoffs in more than a decade, and the NHL’s Sabres have not played in a Stanley Cup since 1999).

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